From the archive, originally posted by: [ spectre ]
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/14796363.htm
Boxes of Saddam Hussein regime correspondence now on the web
While our government may be eagerly classifying everything it can, it
is rapidly releasing boxloads of Arabic-language documents prepared by
elements of Saddam Hussein’s regime.
The Wichita Eagle reported on Monday:
“If you’ve ever thought you might do a better job interpreting
intelligence data than the nation’s experts, here’s your chance. The
U.S. Army is the process of posting online 48,000 boxes of
Arabic-language documents captured by U.S. troops during the war with
Iraq. The document dump, which is being done at the request of Sen. Pat
Roberts, among others, is an unprecedented experiment in public access.
The idea is that thousands of eyes on open records will do a better job
of interpreting intelligence than the eyes of a few military experts.
Roberts, the head of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, urged
the U.S. director of national intelligence last fall to make the
documents public.
“The sheer volume of materials that we have obtained is overwhelming
our intelligence community’s ability to properly categorize and
translate the contents and report to users the knowledge generated,” he
and the House Intelligence chairman wrote to the director last
November. Many of the documents, Roberts wrote, “could be worked by
people who do not have security clearances.”
Since the release, people have indeed worked the documents and have
already contributed to making headlines. Documents released in March
suggested that Russia may have passed American war plans to the Iraqis.
In May, a translated 2001 document discussed production of nerve gas
detectors prohibited by the United Nations.”
—
“At the request of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence,
the US Army Foreign Military Studies Office has created this portal to
provide the general public with access to unclassified documents and
media captured during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The US Government has
made no determination regarding the authenticity of the documents,
validity or factual accuracy of the information contained therein, or
the quality of any translations, when available.
Welcome to the Operation Iraqi Freedom Document Portal
The documents contained on this site were captured during Operation
Iraqi Freedom and represent a dramatic departure from previous document
release efforts which have historically taken place decades after the
cessation of hostilities. Viewers are urged to carefully read the
disclaimer above.
The following is a sample of the types of documents, audio and video
files available in the Portal. The overwhelming majority of these
documents are not in English, although English translations (full or
partial) are posted when available.”
—
http://www.odni.gov/
ODNI press release and public affairs contact information